


Frosty Silence In The Gardens

by Smilla



Category: Without a Trace
Genre: 2006, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-19
Updated: 2010-03-19
Packaged: 2017-10-08 03:31:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/72251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smilla/pseuds/Smilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Martin hates Sundays</p>
            </blockquote>





	Frosty Silence In The Gardens

**Frosty Silence In The Gardens**

Sunday is the day of silence.

Martin wakes up already feeling Danny's absence. The apartment is too silent and hollow; there is no noise coming from his kitchen to greet him. Danny cooking breakfast is one of the things he loves best about Danny spending the night – and in the last two months, it's happened more times he's letting himself count.

But never on Sunday.

He shouldn't resent it so much and Danny's obligations towards what remains of his family are too clear in his mind to actually give him the right to begrudge Danny for never staying on Sunday. Still, he always indulges for a bit in the sense of abandonment he feels when he passes through the living room and Danny not being there hits him full force with the lack of physical evidence.

Danny's coat is not hanging haphazardly on the back of his sofa, and his shoes have not tumbled in the centre of the room the night before when he'd stripped.

He's never asked Danny to stay on Sunday, too caught between the need to hold back and forcefully take. Stunned still by what's happening, by the sheer easiness of this… thing he has with Danny.

There is no holding back his emotions on Sunday mornings, though, and Martin misses the soft sound of Danny's laughter when Martin enters the kitchen, bleary-eyed and sleepy, and hugs Danny from behind; Martin always closes his eyes and presses himself flush against Danny's back, absorbs his heat, lets his skin feel Danny's muscles shifting with whatever movement he's doing.

And if he replies to Danny's questions with unintelligible grunts, it's not because Martin is not a morning person, but it's because he loves to hear Danny's voice reverberating through his chest and blending into his skin.

Danny always cooks healthy foods, carbohydrates and proteins and no trace of fat, and Martin tells him he's no fun just to hear him laughing again, and he just knows that Danny's eyes always go dark with lust when he replies that it's not what Martin thought the night before.

Martin always blushes a deep, unflattering red, but Danny doesn't see him because he never turns around.

Reversing back to his old habits is easy when Danny is not there to keep him straight, so Martin doesn't bother cooking, fills instead a bowl with cereal – coated with sugar and so sweet that he can almost see Danny wincing – and drowns it with cold milk. He goes to the window to eat and when he looks upward, the sky is dark with the promise of rain and a storm that has been brewing for days.

He doesn't mind the rain for himself as much as he does for Danny; knows that his nephew will be disappointed if Danny can't take him outside, knows that Danny will have a long drive to the prison and back, and even if the drive is the easiest part of Danny's trips, worrying about rain and slick concrete is what Martin does.

Even as he thinks it, the first drops hit the glass, heavy and rounded, leaving streaks like tears that pool on the narrow ledge of the window, then continue their path, forced by gravity.

Martin hates Sundays.

When he was a child, Sundays had the sound of constricting clothes that made him twitch, of the clang-clang of the incensory followed by its acrid smell. Hushed tones and sharp commands when Martin tugged uncomfortably at his tie. Churches were always cold and dusty, and his father's back was ramrod straight, his mother fingernails hard and glistening in the yellow light, her clothes soft and expensively scented.

He's never understood his parents' faith, the subject lost among many things Martin has never found the will nor the time to dwell on, filed it among those inexplicable mysteries that are his parents. Shadows and grey areas, and, sometimes, Martin is unkind enough that he thinks going to church was just one voice in the interminable lists of things his parents considered politely unavoidable and socially acceptable.

He shakes off the unkind thought, rejecting it with a sudden jerk of his head. The movement is enough to get him started, and his apartment is a mess and won't clean itself, laundry needs to be done and Martin forces himself to get lost in a the familiar routine of Sundays.

It doesn't stop his mind from wandering along paths he's in no way ready to follow; stubbornly he tries to picture Danny instead, imagining what he's doing right now with a seven-year-old boy with too much energy to stay inside on a Sunday's morning. Martin can't help but laugh softly to himself thinking about Danny and his natural ease with children. Not that he knows what Danny is like with his family, but over the years, he's had enough images of Danny dealing with children to fill the gaps.

And maybe Danny is not so at ease with his nephew, maybe Danny is tentative and insecure whenever he deals with his family – he knows that he would have every right to be, anyway – but this doesn't keep him from wondering what it is that he lacks that Danny has, that makes Danny say the right words, with the right intonation at the right time. What makes children and teens - and people in general, he realizes – trust Danny implicitly.

_I'm a social animal_, Danny told him once, and Martin had let the pun pass because Danny's tongue was flickering just behind his ear, wet and hot, and Martin couldn't focus enough to snap back a smart-assed reply.

A social animal, Danny had said, but Martin would have objected, that no, Danny is not social, he is compassionate and true and as real as the many people that pass through their lives.

Social were his family visits to his grandfather, dinner after the mass, and more silence that sounded of ancient things and a more ancient scent. His grandfather always gave him stern, penetrating looks that made Martin wish he could hide, leaving him wondering what he knew that Martin didn't. He asked the same questions each week, changing them ever so slightly as Martin passed from child to teen.

_Men in my family aren't particularly into the close thing_, he had told Sam once, and he doesn't know what compelled him to say it, regretted while his voice was still echoing in the ticking silence of the old house that smelled like his grandfather did. Sam's expression had said it all even then, sympathy preceded by confusion, there just for a moment in the arc of her eyebrows, but enough for Martin to see it.

Martin had decided to be blind, overlook the rift that would never be filled between them, space that was as hollow as Sam's stilted words.

Silence in his grandfather's house was the loud ticking of the clock in the hall, the scrape of fork against aged porcelain – terror whenever he brought his plate to the sink, that he would drop it. Every damn week, save when Martin had been merrily parked at Bonnie's house and until his grandfather had passed away.

Then, Martin had felt guiltily relieved, but the respite had been short-lived and Sunday dinner had been replaced by expensive restaurants where the silence had become even more deafening because of the happy hum of voices around them.

Sometimes, Martin had imagined himself screaming just to break that silence, had gone so far as to open his mouth, imagined the shocked expression on his mother's delicate face, wondered if it would be enough to break his father's impassiveness.

Sadly, the scream had stayed lodged in his throat to the point that Martin had almost choked on it.

***

Sunday is a day of silence, of the rain knocking on the glass, low rumble of thunder in the distance, and of the sound of his own breath, scrape of clothes and muffled steps while he methodically dusts flat wooden surfaces, makes them shine until he can almost see his reflection.

He puts clothes away based on colors, folds them perfectly like he did before he had fell apart, even if now he finds the routine boring. He does it anyway, methodically, therapeutically.

And when the phone doesn't ring at the end of the day, Martin will forgive Danny for being bone-deep tired inside and outside; however, he will not forgive himself for not being a different person, for not taking the phone in his hands and calling Danny instead.

When he goes to bed, earlier than usual, he's grateful Sunday has eventually ended, can't bring himself to open the book that's lying on his nightstand untouched for last two months, words too pale compared to Danny's vibrant and all-consuming presence.

Danny's scent is only a flickering memory replaced by clean sheets that smell of soap, and the longing he feels is too deep and makes Martin ache.

\--

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Neko for beta reading and for providing the inspiration for the title, wich comes from What The Thunder Said by T.S. Elliot.


End file.
